Micro Reviews

Okay, my “short” reviews don’t seem to be that short anymore. So, in the interests of returning to my terse roots, reviews in three sentences or fewer!

Proust Was a Neuroscientist (Jonah Lehrer, 2007) — I loved this book on the relationship between science and the humanities. The analysis of modernists from a variety of arts was broad enough to be interesting, specific enough to be relevant, and engaging enough to get me interested in writers and artists whose work I never thought I’d care about before. Some readers might find its wide scope to prompt oversimplification on some issues, and they’d be right, but it’s never inaccurate enough to be a deal-breaker.

The Reformed Vampire Support Group (Catherine Jinks, 2009) — This was a fun story about a teenaged girl vampire in a world where being a vampire is the opposite of sparkly: more like a terminal illness that just never ends in death. I didn’t find the characters or plot terribly attractive, but it was a fun read nonetheless. I liked that my favourite character turned out to be a horrible person who was deservedly punished, the way such people are in real life, rather than a sexy bad boy who acts without consequences.

Why We Make Mistakes (Joe Hallinan, 2009) — Interesting book, very readable, but nothing new to bring to the table for those who already have an interest or a cursory education in psychology, statistics, and/or logical fallacies. I whipped through it in an hour or so, but I already forget most of what it was about, except a feeling of familiarity and entertainment.

The Vanished Man (Jeffrey Deaver, 2009) — As always, I like the fast-paced, clever Lincoln Rhyme thrillers. It boggles my mind that reviews seem to like comparing each book to the others in the series. Why — is anyone really going to read the books out of order and skip the ones that got slightly poorer reviews?

Another Fine Math You’ve Got Me Into (Ian Stewart, 1992) — Ian Stewart writes awesome short articles, usually filled with groan-inducing puns (a vice of his chosen profession?), that expound on mathematical subjects in an engaging way. The treatises do move fast, so beware: Stewart wants you to stop and think and tinker with problems, and if you’re impatient like me, you might not get all you could out of this book.

The Adoration of Jenna Fox (Mary E. Pearson, 2009) — This story of an amnesiac young woman who’s just recovering from a near-fatal accident didn’t quite go where I thought it would, but it raises interesting questions about the persistance of identity and whether there should be restrictions on medical science. Given that the reader starts off the story with the notion that something is up, the author does a great job of balancing the protagonist’s natural doubt and her growing knowledge that weird things are going down. I felt like it could have gone deeper into exploring the issues it did, particularly since the character didn’t really excite me, but it was an intriguing read in any case.

Lucky Number Slevin (2006) — Full disclosure: I’ve only seen the last half of this movie, but my cousin Daniel (whose movie it was… thanks, Dan!) gave a pretty good sum-up of the first part of this weird film about an unlucky gambler whose family is murdered by his mob debtors and a seemingly unrelated but obviously connected story about a hit man (Bruce Willis) and a guy who keeps finding himself in the wrong place at the wrong time (Josh Harnett). That was a pretty long sentence, so this one will be short. This movie is the type where at the end you think, “So… if you told the story in the usual way from the typical protagonist’s POV, it would be pretty straightforward”, but the joy of this story was the way it was told, with snappy dialogue, amazing direction, and cool back-and-forth editing.

Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (Nintendo DS, 2005) — Whatever, haters, l couldn’t put this game down. It combines the elements I love best of RPGs (levelling up, exploration, upgrading abilities and weapons) and 2D platformers (jumping puzzles, moving and fighting in real time, secret areas). The one bad thing is a touch-screen gimmick where, once you reduce a boss to zero HP, you have to draw a seal to end the fight — I hate having to start over because my fingers are too shaky to switch from buttons to stylus fast enough.

The Silence of the Lambs (Thomas Harris, 1988) — What can I say about this classic? Having seen the movie, I wasn’t as thrilled or chilled by the various plot twists, but the writing pulls you along. I liked the new insights on Clarice’s personality and the details that movies inevitably have to leave out for the sake of time and pacing.

Soulless (Gail Carriger, 2009) — This urban-fantasy/Pride and Prejudice-style romance had enough to keep me intrigued, but I was irritated by the way point of view shifted suddenly and often between paragraphs in mid-scene. The frothy, witty tone of the writing and the main conceit (vampires, werewolves, and ghosts in Victorian England being the results of excess of soul) were both aspects that kept me hooked; I was disappointed in the concurrent romance, which seemed not to be very much about a funny meeting of minds a la Benedick and Beatrice and more about the two main characters almost having sex several times until they finally get married and do (and have it described way more graphically than in a Victorian novel — actual Jane Austen fans, beware!).

Hexaflexagons, Probability Paradoxes, and the Tower of Hanoi (Martin Gardner, 2008) — I was surprised to find myself more engrossed with this book than with the Stewart one above. The chapters are less  whimsical, but more concise, shorter, and more focussed. I even managed to make my very own hexahexaflexagon (… and subsequently break it. Let’s not talk about it)!

… and in conclusion? Some of those sentences cheated by being super-long or making liberal use of semicolons, parentheses, and dashes, but it’s a start!